Diacritica 25-2_Filosofia.indb - cehum - Universidade do Minho

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HASSE HÄMÄLÄINEN
que actualmente temos à nossa disposição para lidar com o EEV são insufi cientes.
E, em seguida, argumentarei não apenas que o EEV é um problema real para a EV,
pois permitiria a manipulação ética sob a aparência da sabedoria prática, mas também
que a EV consegue libertar-se deste problema. Evitar a manipulação fornece
a qualquer pessoa uma razão política persuasiva para escolher os seus modelos de
forma independente.
Palavras-chave: Ética das Virtudes, elitismo, sabedoria prática, consequencialismo,
teoria do valor, Aristóteles
It is for this reason we think Pericles and men like him have practical wisdom
(phronesis), viz. because they can see what is good for themselves and what
is good for men in general. (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 6.5 1140b7-19) [1]
A man has practical wisdom not by knowing only but by acting. (EN 7.10
1152a8-9)
1. Practical wisdom and ethical value
virtue ethics (VE) may read Aristotle’s fi rst statement above to be proposing
that the reason why some people are considered practically wise (phronimoi)
is that they are the best to see what would be appropriate to do. Th us their
ethical insight can be said to be the most accurate. Moreover – just as Aristotle
argues in EN 6.13 1143b30-20 “it is neither possible to be properly virtuous
without practical wisdom nor practically wise without virtue” – so VE holds
that only a practically wise person acts – to use Christine Swanton’s terms
- from virtue. Th at is, what such a person knows to be appropriate to do,
she, as Aristotle’s second statement could be taken to imply, also usually does
and what she usually does is both systematically appropriate and done from
appropriate reasons. [2] Th is is what having practical wisdom entails.
Th e people, whose insight is less accurate, and who are capable of systematically
seeing neither appropriate actions and in some cases nor appropriate
reasons for them can, however, still act virtuously. Th ey can act so by
consciously keeping virtue as the explicit guideline of their acting. [3]
1 My quotations of Aristotle are from Th e Revised Oxford Translation (Aristotle 1995)
2 Th ere is a variety of ways to conceive the relation between moral insight and doing well. One
can take them to be the same thing, viz. that seeing necessarily motivates one to do well, or
think that they are diff erent, viz. that one’s seeing motivates her only if she has correct desires.
Th is interesting question is, however, not relevant to the argument of my paper.
3 See Swanton 2003, pp. 231 & 233, Cf. EN 2.4 1122b1ff .
Diacritica 25-2_Filosofia.indb 80 05-01-2012 09:38:22